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Friday, February 13, 2015

Review: West of the Moon by Margi Preus

West of the Moon

By Margi Preus

Blurb: Astri is a young
Norwegian girl desperate to join her father in America. After being
separated from her sister and sold to a cruel goat farmer, Astri makes a
daring escape. She quickly retrieves her little sister, and, armed with
a troll treasure, a book of spells and curses, and a possibly magic
hairbrush, they set off for America. With a mysterious companion in tow
and the malevolent “goatman” in pursuit, the girls head over the
Norwegian mountains, through field and forest, and in and out of
folktales and dreams as they steadily make their way east of the sun and
west of the moon.

West of the Moon
is different. What does that mean, exactly? Well, it means that this
book is basically like nothing I have ever read before, which doesn't
happen often. However, the ending sucked, to be blunt. So, that kind of
brought down my love for this story.

What's nice about this book
is that it is somewhat fantastical, but not really. I thought this
really captured the feel of the book; it gave it a unique, authentic
flavor that made the story feel a bit like an actual Norse folk tale.
This is what I most liked about West of the Moon.

Astri,
the main character, can be rather selfish at times, and she does things
without the purest of intentions. I got mad at her more than a few
times during the book. But she still manages to stay one of those
characters that you want to have a happy ending.

The plot is
interesting; it takes little bits from different folktales and fairy
tales and weaves them into the story, and there's an aspect of mystery,
which I always love. I went through the book wanting answers to Astri's
past and the silent little girl that she traveled with. I got hints
throughout the book, but it wasn't until the end that everything was
revealed.

And that is where my liking of this book turned into
disappointment. This ending is not happy in the slightest. It is not
blatantly sad, but it definitely made me mopey. West of the Moon
has more of an open ending, which is okay with some books, I suppose,
but none of the things that I wanted to be resolved were! Or, if they
were resolved, they were resolved in a way that made me mad, which is
just as bad, if not worse, than having them left open.

This book did slightly redeem itself after
the ending, though, because I read the author's notes. These are
usually not that interesting (to me at least) but in this story, I
really loved the explanations and the background history we got for this
book. The story behind the idea for this book, for some reason,
fascinates me. I want to know more about it, but I guess I won't be able
to--it's history that we only get a snippet of.

The story is
great, the ending is not. There's my warning to you for this book; if
you want to take your chances, that's up to you. Personally, I'm not
disappointed that I did.